USW: Tip the World Over on Its Side

The Church of Death Triumphant

“There’s the Church of Death Triumphant in Los Angeles, who are either a bunch of loser pervs or the bringers of the apocalypse.” — Unknown Armies, second edition, page 85

The Church of Death Triumphant was bad news — on the surface, they were just a bunch of Satanist wannabes with more money than sense, but they mixed it up with the underground and there was word that they got a little mojo in the early 2000s. More importantly, their leader, Mordecai Thanatos, could call upon a handful of hardcases to do whatever he wanted. Nobody really figured out what that was, but a Satan-worshiping death-cult doesn’t exactly give anyone the warm fuzzies.

All that changed in 2005. Mordecai Thanatos died in a house fire (fell asleep while smoking a cigar, according to the coroner’s report). One of his seconds, a guy named Robert (but going by “Raven”), got a bullet through his neck (he was apparently a smuggler who crossed some mob connection somewhere).

These things happened the same day.

The police didn’t have enough information to make the connection, but among those in the know, you didn’t have to be a genius to see a pattern. Nobody knows who did it (The Sleepers? TNI? The Catholic Church?), but nobody wanted to be next. The rest of the Church of Death Triumphant scattered like rats from a sinking ship. Whether that’s a vacuum to be filled remains to be seen, but for now, everyone’s just glad they’re gone.